D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[Hussar]

Simulations frequently gloss over details and the rules cannot fill in all the details for everything. You don't get to decide which details are important for anyone but you.

Again, there's a huge excluded middle here between fill in all the details for everything and provide ANY details at all. I'm not deciding which details are important because D&D provides absolutely NO details to compare. All the details are generated by the DM. Which is perfectly fair. You like gamist games. That's great. D&D has long been very gamist and glories in that.

Any simulation you have is 100% being generated by the DM after the fact. Again, perfectly fine. I like that too. I'm just not going to pretend that D&D is somehow simulating anything. It really, really isn't.

 

[The Firebird]

But, again, it's not even "fixed world". Not as soon as you use random encounters. Or you add details like "crumbling rocks" causing falls. The second you add a detail in response to a failed check in order to narrate why that check failed, you no longer have a "fixed world".

Cliff - DC 15, unstable rocks. Fixed.

On a 1-in-6 chance, a guard is present. Fixed.

A cook may or may not be present, depending on whether the player hits a 10+. Not fixed. Modified by the PCs skill.

 

[AlViking]

That's not what the narrative said though. The character fell because the rock crumbled. It's not "flair", it's the direct cause. It's no different than the cook being there because of the failed check or the random encounter poofing into the area of the PC's because of a random check.

These are are identical. The game world is being retroactively changed by the DM to fit with die rolls. Note, the die rolls themselves aren't actually informing any of the narrative. It's all being 100% added by the DM. So, not simulating anything. Just adding stuff to make the game more interesting and fun.

The direct cause was a failed climb check. The crumbling rock was just fluff on why the climb check failed.

 

[Hussar]

The DM description can vary, it MUST vary within the bounds of the gravity simulation provided by the rules.

Nope.

You could fall because fairies popped out of the ground and pulled you off the hill. The rules in no way contract this.

Now, granted, the group probably wouldn't be very happy. But, the system? Not a problem at all.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Yeah, this is one point of disconnect. If the players in your game are not trying to win, if the social contract underlying it says that trying to win is bad form--then yeah, that's part of why it doesn't appeal to me. In a narrative system "playing to win" clashes with the feeling of immersion. This is why I say that, for me, narrative games don't feel like games. They feel like they are about telling a story.

I'd suspect there are plenty of people who are trying, in narrative games, to "win" its just that the win condition involves arriving at a satisfying conclusion rather than in a more traditional sense.

 

[Hussar]

I asked WHY the system has to be the one to the lifting in order for there to be verisimilitude

It doesn't.

The system has to be the one doing the lifting in order to be a simulation.

 

[Maxperson]

Nope.

You could fall because fairies popped out of the ground and pulled you off the hill. The rules in no way contract this.

First, even that simulates gravity. The point is that it doesn't matter why DM is narrating with the bounds of the games simulated gravity rules. It only matter that he has to do it or else it's a violation of the social contract and isn't applicable to this discussion.

Second, bad DMing doesn't prove or disprove anything about how the rules work in 99% of game play.

The rules provide the simulation and the DM just provides the color to that simulation. Verisimilitdue, virismiltudytude, veriannoyingword, screw it, realism is present regardless of whether it comes from the rules, the DM, or a combination of both.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'd suspect there are plenty of people who are trying, in narrative games, to "win" its just that the win condition involves arriving at a satisfying conclusion rather than in a more traditional sense.

A satisfying conclusion to the story being told.

 

[Maxperson]

It doesn't.

The system has to be the one doing the lifting in order to be a simulation.

D&D does that in spades. Gravity is simulated. Weapons are simulated. Armor is simulated. Walking is simulated. Ships are simulated. Worlds, which includes trees, grass, berries, and millions of more things are simulated. Skills are simulated. And on and on and on and on. The DM is just providing color to the multitudes of things that are simulated by the rules and lore.

 

[FrogReaver]

On the crumbling rocks…

Consider what’s been established. The pc is climbing a rocky cliff. A failed climb check need not mean you fall off the cliff. So I’m already a bit puzzled with why the result of the failed check is falling.

Now suppose we had fictionally established the detail that some of the rocks looked loose/crumbly. Now the fall result works! But the example is no longer adding crumbly rocks after the roll.

If a dm has you fall on a failed climb check (athletics in 5e) and those specific details aren’t present I think it’s a problem. Albeit a different class of one than the cook.